It would be on par with knowing how to recieve a guest or sit for/host a proper dinner (lunch) or supper (formal evening meal), which were all essential of any gentleman of the time. Virginia gentlemen in particular greatly prided themselves on their social wherewithal and ability to act graciously (ironically, of course, these same men held humans in bondage, but that's a bit tangential to our topic at hand). The two things that ranked at the top of this list of ungracious behaviours were lying and being of mean spirit. I recently remarked elsewhere how G Washington once bowed/tipped his hat to an old enslaved man in the street because the man had first done the same, and General Washington wasn't going to be less gracious than the old man. That's one of a gazillion examples of this desire to be - and be known as - an elegantly civilized and well cultured gentry landowner class.

Music in all forms fit into this narrative, too. When the great colonial statesman John Randolph, the father of statesman Edmund Randolph and brother to first congressional president Peyton Randolph, decided he wasn't on board with this whole independence thing and would leave America, he first settled a bet between himself and a young Virginia Burgesses member involving his cherished violin, gifting it to the man as their bet had yet to be decided and he would be leaving Virginia forever. That young man, a music lover himself, was the delegate from Albemarle County, Mr Thomas Jefferson. He already had his own fiddle, and so loved to play it that when his Shadwell home burned and he asked if his books had been saved the man first reporting the fire to him said "No" before adding "but we save your fiddle." It's also a long told story that two men went to approach a young woman available to court, but upon approaching her home they heard two instruments and two voices. Recognizing the voice of the widowed woman, Martha Skelton, and the man's voice as that of Jefferson, they gave up the mission and left. Soonafter Martha became Mrs Martha Jefferson. The point here is that music was vitally important to being a gentleman.

But that's not dancing, and you asked about dancing. Well, that was equally important, if not moreso. Another quick tale - Benjamin Franklin describes in his autobiography providing a man the equipment to establish a print shop, paying 1/3 expenses and reaping 1/3 profits. He elaborates on how the man could never send him proper records or accounts of the business but one day the man died. His wife took over and was able to muddle through the scant records to send a more accurate historic accounting, then continued to do so quarterly and with great accuracy. Franklin attributes this to her being Dutch and being raised in that country where accounting and records may be taught, at least in part, to a young lady. He then champions this broader education in America as, in his words, it provides a much better stability for a woman and her children in the event she becomes a widow than the "dancing and music" courses they recieved here at that time. In other words, throughout the colonies a young woman would study music and dancing; it was a very important part of life. That woman, btw, ran the shop succesfully and purchased it outright from Franklin, then set her son to become a printer in life. As for young men, they would also attend classes with a "Dance Master" to learn the proper dances of the time and proper behaviour/posture while dancing. It really was a whole big thing.

How did dancing become such a vital part of late colonial life? Virginia turned a huge corner in the late 17th/early 18th century: Slavery was becoming very defined and ubiquetous, mortality rates were decreasing, elite planters were establishing very large plantations and land holdings, and the wall that is the Blue Ridge Mountains was hit (and crossed by Gov Spotswood in 1716, the man that sent Maynard to kill or capture Blackbeard in 1718). Life was becoming very stable for some and the ability for a colonial born gentry planter class emerged as a result. At this same time, in 1699, a new capital was built named Williamsburg. While the still emerging tobacco stlye agriculture of Virginia, which required little in the way of merchant towns, kept the new capital relative empty, it was the place to be when the Burgesses met and often had more people than beds during those times. In fact it wasn't uncommon for the number of visitors to be well beyond the number of full time residents. And since they were essentially all from the new gentry class they needed entertainment in the town befitting their status. Homes, taverns, the College of William and Mary, and even the Governers Palace were all utilized for dances and balls, and in 1718 a man capitalized on this and built an establishment named the Play Booth, which was British North America's first theatre and by 1737 W&M had a school of dance for boys.

Leading up to that point, the gentry and elite of Europe had been dancing for a while, and those trends arrived with arrivals of that class, namely in politics. Gov Alexander Spotswood earned the title governor in 1710. A year later he threw a ball as a bachelor and all the elites attended. His first choice of dance partner was another man's wife, and it was seen as an honor not only to the lady but the husband as well, for the highest ranking aristocrat in Virginia had selected her for the first dance, a "French dance." It was politics, popularity, and entertainment all in one. And beyond this men were judged on how well they performed. Complex dances like the minuet were popular, as they required coordination with a partner, grace and balance. To put it plainly, if you couldn't dance, you would certainly lose points big time and not just in the dating game, which was just as closely tied to perception and station as it was actual attraction. A poor performance wouldn't just hurt how women viewed you as a suitor, it would impact how the gentry as a whole ranked you amongst themselves. Also about this time, in 1706, a French book was translated and published as The Art of Dancing, and Benjamin Franklin was born. Two years later Martha Ball - George Washingtons mother - was born, as was Peter Jefferson, Thomas' father. The culture had long brewed by the time our founders arrived on the scene.

Cont'd